The increasing world population (now five billion) has led to housing shortages worldwide. These shortages are also increasing due to the number of people left homeless from natural disasters. Accordingly, there is a need for low cost housing that may be easily transported and assembled where needed, and later disassembled and moved.
While many attempts have been made to provide portable building structures, these structures suffer from numerous disadvantages. Many of these structures are heavy, complex and costly to make, and difficult to assemble and disassemble. In addition, many of these building structures require constant maintenance; for example, wooden structures tend to splinter and constantly need to be waterproofed. Moreover, these building structures tend to corrode due to air pollutants and rust, rot or mildew due to adverse weather conditions. Also, many of the prior art devices require special tools for assembly and disassembly.
Examples of these prior building structures are disclosed in the following U.S. Pat. Nos.: 617,043 to Phifer; 1,062,976 to Jackson; 1,149,213 to Neuberth; 1,469,525 to Nadolney; 1,481,142 to Minton et al; 2,207,836 to Sundell; 2,591,984 to Walsh; 3,189,949 to Hurkamp; 3,341,987 to Johansson; 3,434,253 to Hatcher; 3,452,501 to Zimmer et al; 3,562,973 to Gangemi; 3,566,554 to Schaffer et al; 3,781,944 to Gianardi; 3,984,949 to Wahlquist; 3,886,676 to Alfonso; 4,035,964 to Robinson; 4,166,343 to O'Brian et al; 4,439,969 to Bartlett; 4,544,300 to Lew et al; 4,641,475 to Berridge; 4,641,985 to Bard et al; 4,649,684 to Petree et al; 4,652,170 to Lew; 4,696,132 to LeBlanc; 4,726,155 to Nahmias; and 4,742,653 to Napier et al.
This invention addresses these needs discussed above in the art, along with other needs which will become apparent to those skilled in the art once given this disclosure.